| Lyrics |
Benny Andersson, Tim Rice, and Bjorn Ulvaeus
THE RUSSIAN: Knowing I want you Knowing I love you I can't explain why I remain Careless about you FLORENCE: I've been a fool to allow Dreams to become great expectations THE RUSSIAN: How can I love you so much yet make no move? BOTH: I pray the days and nights In their endless weary procession Soon overwhelm my sad obsession You and I We've seen it all Chasing our hearts' desire But we go on pretending Stories like ours Have happy endings THE RUSSIAN: You could not give me More than you gave me Why should there be something in me Still discontented? FLORENCE: I won't look back anymore And if I do -- just for a moment THE RUSSIAN: I'll soon be happy to say I knew her when BOTH: But if you hear today I'm no longer quite so devoted To this affair, I've been misquoted You and I We've seen it all Chasing our hearts' desire But we go on pretending Stories like ours Have happy endings CHOIR: Each game of chess means there's one less Variation left to be played Each day got through means one or two Less mistakes remain to be made Not much is known Of early days of chess beyond a fairly vague report That fifteen hundred years ago two princes fought, Though brothers, for a Hindu throne Their mother cried For no one really likes their offspring fighting to the death She begged them stop the slaughter with her every breath But sure enough one brother died Sad beyond belief She told her winning son You have caused such grief I can't forgive This evil thing you've done He tried to explain How things had really been But he tried in vain No words of his Could mollify the queen And so he asked The wisest men he knew The way to lessen her distress They told him he'd be pretty certain to impress By using model soldiers on A chequered board to show it was his brother's fault They thus invented chess Chess displayed no inertia Soon spread to Persia Then west Next the Arabs refined it Thus redesigned, it Progressed Still further west And when Constantinople fell in 1453 One would have noticed every other refugee Included in his bags a set Once in the hands And in the minds of leading figures of the Renaissance The spirit and the speed of chess made swift advance Through all of Europe's vital lands Where we must record The game was further changed Right across the board The western touch Upon the pieces ranged King and queen and rook And bishop, knight and pawn All took on the look We know today The modern game was born And in the end We see a game that started by mistake in Hindustan And boosted in the main by what is now Iran Become the simplest and most complicated Pleasure yet devised For just the kind of mind Who would appreciate this well-researched and fascinating yarn FLORENCE: This is an all too familiar scene THE RUSSIAN: Hopeless reflections on what might have been BOTH: From all sides the incessant and burning question: FLORENCE: "
Bearing in mind your predicament now -- THE RUSSIAN: -- what you did then -- BOTH: -- we're just dying to know would you do it all again?" CHOIR: Each day we get through means one less mistake there for the making BOTH: But they know full well It's not hard to tell Though my heart is breaking I'd give the world for that moment with you When we thought we knew That our love would last But the moment passed With no warning, far too fast You and I We've seen it all Chasing our hearts' desire But we go on pretending Stories like ours Have happy endings
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